


Kings of Flowers and Skulls

by Merrinpippy



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Dreams, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Romance, flower symbolism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-05
Updated: 2017-10-08
Packaged: 2018-09-28 13:49:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 20,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10108058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merrinpippy/pseuds/Merrinpippy
Summary: Harry is the King of Flowers. Those who enter his Garden are doomed to fall asleep and never wake up again, but he has not had a friend in his life, and he is lonely with only his plants for company. Tom is the King of Skulls. Those who enter his Graveyard die when they cross the threshold, and though he is lonely, he pretends he likes it this way.Harry and Tom rule their domains alone until one day by chance they meet, and their immortal lives are never the same again.





	1. On Behalf of His Love

The King of Flowers ruled in the Garden. His rule was peaceful, for his subjects were every variation of every plant in his vast, beautiful garden. Many paths wound their way through tree-lined arches and bridges of vines over the rivers where the water hyacinth grew, but the only path that lead to the King’s throne was the one lined with poppies.

His throne was elevated in an atrium of fountains and sunflowers, with lilies wrapping around his plinth and resting against his feet. Those who whispered about him and his garden, for he was known as a cautionary tale that only few believed, knew him as the King of Flowers. But his plants knew him as Harry Potter.

The tale, spread by wizards and muggles alike, spoke of a ruler whose garden was so beautiful that wanderers and greedy hands could not resist pushing open the gates that manifested to anyone who desired to enter.

They would venture inside, but they would never leave. They would get lost, and the longer they stayed, the sleepier they became, until they could not stay awake. They all fell into a deep slumber in the garden, alive, but never to wake again.

This left Harry very lonely. But none of the rumours included that Harry had never had a friend in his life. The rumours also didn’t include what Harry knew about those who wandered in; they could only find the Garden if they were already about to sleep forever, be it by illness, potion, or curse. But the families of those who disappeared could not even be sure that their loved ones were still alive- for they could have also been taken by the _other_ king.

The King of Skulls ruled in the Graveyard. His rule was cynical, for his subjects were the dead. No-one could enter the Graveyard without dying as soon as they crossed the threshold, for they could only find the Graveyard if they were destined to die.

His throne was built from the bones of the long decayed, and the inhabitants of his realm were too dead to whisper the name Tom Riddle in warning to the unwitting travellers outside.

Sometimes Tom would engage his victims in conversation before they died, if he thought them interesting enough. These were the ones who became ghosts when they passed; Myrtle Warren, Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington, Helena Ravenclaw, and so on. However, these ghosts were upset with him for killing them, so their company was either sullen or non-existent.

This left Tom rather lonely. He pretended, at least for a while, that he liked it that way.

-

Every so often, a sleeper in Harry’s Garden would wake up and Harry would accompany them out. On one such occasion, as they neared the gates, Harry stopped short.

“What’s wrong?” the sleeper asked, tugging at his hand. If Harry remembered correctly, his name was Colin.

“What’s that?” Harry replied, pointing beyond the gates.

Harry was used to there being light, whimsical forests outside his Garden. Other times there would be rolling fields of green, or mountainsides. But not… not another set of gates.

Colin looked between them and grinned. “That must be the Graveyard where the King of Skulls lives! Mum used to tell us the stories about you both when we were kids. Have you never met him?” His expression turned contemplative. “Now that I say it, though, I’m not sure I’d want to meet him if everyone who meets him dies.”

Harry stared at the Graveyard gates a moment longer before guiding Colin to the gates of his own Garden.

“Walk in any direction- except for that one I suppose- and you should find yourself where you were when you came here.”

“Thanks, your majesty!” Colin exclaimed, stepping foot outside the Garden for the first time in years.

“Your majesty?” Harry frowned.

“Ye-es...” Colin looked at him in confusion. “That’s what you are, isn’t it? The King of Flowers?”

Before Harry could respond, Colin had disappeared into the distance, back to the waking world. The King of Flowers; It had been a long while since anyone had called him that. Over a hundred years, more maybe. He was slipping into legend, but that did not mean that he was any less real.

He hadn’t heard of the King of Skulls before, though. Perhaps they were the same.

Harry stepped closer to the gates, never going outside, but observing with interest the forbidding iron gates and low fence around the Graveyard. There were gravestones, but that was all that Harry could make out. It appeared to be quite large, maybe as large as his own garden. Harry was about to climb a tree to see if he could gauge the size of the Graveyard when a sudden movement stopped him.

Colin was back, trudging regretfully towards the Graveyard. He spared a look for Harry, a small sad wave, but did not waver in his footsteps.

“Wait!” Harry called out, and then Colin did hesitate, but a hand reached out from the gates and pulled Colin inside. Colin’s body crumpled to the ground, and Harry felt anger for the first time in hundreds of years. “Hey! What the hell are you doing?!”

A handsome dark-haired head peered through the gates and disappeared. Harry was about to shout again when the head appeared once more, this time some distance to the left of the gate where it was closer to the Garden. Harry dashed about twenty paces to glare at the head directly across from him.

“Who are you?” The dark-haired man asked, calm and curious. Now that Harry was closer he could see even better his attractive aristocratic features that seemed familiar somehow… but that was not what he was here for.

“Who are-? No! What was that?!”

“The boy? He’s dead. I thought that was pretty obvious.” The King of Skulls rested an arm on the wall, uncaring.

“Because you killed him!” Harry said fiercely.

The King of Skulls shook his head. “He was attacked by bandits. He died. That’s why I’m here,” he gestured to his graveyard. “To collect him.”

“Bandits…” Harry looked beyond the King’s shoulder, but could not see Colin. Realising he could do nothing, Harry deflated, leaning too on the beflowered fence of his garden. “He’d only just woken up,” he said mournfully. “He was going to live.”

“How long was he asleep?” the King asked.

“Years,” Harry lamented. “Seven. He was a photographer. He dreamed of his brother…” When Harry looked up, it was to see the other man staring at him, an odd expression on his face.

“You really care about him,” he stated.

“I care about everyone in my Garden,” Harry said. “Don’t you?”

The King didn’t answer this, instead tilting his head thoughtfully. “So it’s true. You’re the King of Flowers, aren’t you?”

Harry frowned. “I’m just Harry.”

This made the other King smile. “Well, ‘just Harry’, if you’d like you can call me Tom.”

Wait. “Tom… Tom Riddle?”

Tom’s eyebrows raised in surprise. “How do you-? _Oh_ … you’re thinking of my father, Tom Riddle Senior.”

“He’s sleeping in my garden,” said Harry.

“I know. I put him there,” said Tom.

Harry swallowed. A bird in Harry’s garden began to sing. Tom changed the subject.

“It’s curious that we’ve never met before. Do you know any others like us?” he asked.

Harry shook his head. “I didn’t even know about you until Colin told me. Do you?”

“No. I only ever speak to people as they come to die. But as you saw, I don’t talk to them often. Most of them are... boring,” Tom said, and Harry couldn’t tell if he was including Harry in that or not.

“I only speak to people as they wake up and leave,” Harry said, rather than ask. He slept sometimes, and in those times he could see the sleepers in the dreamworld, but he could never speak to them. Sometimes he wished that when they woke up they would stay with him, but that was not how it worked. Perhaps if Colin had stayed with him he wouldn’t be dead...

Tom was looking at him as though he could see his thoughts, and Harry’s face reddened.

“If you want,” Tom said carefully, “we could try a trade.”

Harry leaned forward. “A trade?”

“I’ll give you Colin back if you give me one of yours. Someone who will never wake up, who may as well be dead.” Tom gave Harry an expectant look.

Harry cycled through the inhabitants of his Garden in his head, none of whom he wanted _dead_ , but some of whom would never wake. One of those for Colin… he could justify that. Eventually he said, “Your father will sleep forever.”

Tom smirked. “Glorious, I’d love to kill him. Is it a deal?” Tom reached his arm over the wall. They were close enough that Harry could just about grasp his hand and shake it.

“Deal,” said Harry, smiling for the first time. Tom reacted to this, his own smirk widening, but then their hands were pulled away, and something like a transparent curtain flickered like a breeze between them.

Startled, Harry looked around- their domains were shifting away from each other. He met Tom’s slowly retreating eyes.

“We’ll find each other,” Harry said, more seriously than he would have liked, for Tom had not appeared to hold the same desire for his company.

Tom, however, nodded. He did not break eye contact until a strange mist hid him from view, and then Harry found his garden at the bottom of a ravine.

The mist made visibility poor, and it seeped into Harry’s garden, obscuring any trace that Tom or the other place had been there. Another person like him… Harry had thought he was alone. Had gotten used to the idea. But only now did he truly understand; after all this time alone Harry craved company more than ever before, and more than any mortal could. He craved company, even from a mysterious man he’d only just met.

When two men stumbled through the gates, Harry let go of his thoughts and realised why he was here in the ravine. Blood stained their clothing, and though Harry couldn’t see very far, he guessed that were he to look up on a clear day he would see their climbing equipment. Explorers.

He watched silently as the two men- one younger and one older, both blonde, probably father and son- looked around, dazed, and slowly came to rest on the ground. Fast asleep. They would be here for four months, Harry instinctively knew, before they woke and left.

As Harry gazed on, a nearby flitterbloom wrapped its swaying tentacles around the two and began to move them towards the atrium where all of the sleepers lay.

Would Tom keep his word and send Colin back to him? Harry didn’t know. He decided to leave Tom Riddle Senior alone for now, though, until he was sure.

-

It was, to Harry’s counting, a week later when Colin arrived back at the Garden.

His skin was horribly pale and sallow, his features decaying, but as soon as he stepped over the threshold life seemed to spring back into him. Harry rushed to greet him and Colin grinned at the sight.

“Did you speak to him, then?”

Harry nodded. “Are you okay?”

Colin shrugged. “I died,” he said, as if that explained everything. Harry supposed it did. “He gave me a message for you, rather rudely I might add… wait...”

“You’re going back to sleep,” Harry said gently, as Colin yawned and pulled out a piece of paper from his pocket.

“For how long?”

“A few months. Not over a year.”

“Take the message,” Colin said, pushing it into Harry’s hands. Harry didn’t unfold it yet. “And um, your majesty? Thank you for saving me.”

Colin swayed and then fell. Harry caught him in his arms. He was asleep. Harry picked him up and began to carry him to the sleepers’ atrium, the soft summer breeze brushing his back.

Harry let Colin down in the shade of a wiggentree, and only after he wiped the sweat from his brow did he unfold the note still clutched in his hand.

_This one’s a chatterer, I’m glad to be rid of him._

Harry rolled his eyes, folded the letter up and put it into the pocket below his lapel. He roamed over the field of the sleeping until he found that face so similar to Tom’s. He couldn’t wake the man up (or at least he didn’t think he could), but he supposed he could make him sleepwalk.

“Stand,” he said experimentally, for he hadn’t done this in a very long time, and stepped back hurriedly when the man obeyed his command. Harry nodded in satisfaction and turned away. “Follow me,” he said.

The soft thuds behind him told him that this command was being obeyed too.

When Harry reached the gate, he realised two things. One, he should probably send a message back, and two, he didn’t know how to get to the Graveyard.

The first was solved easily enough with an “ _Accio_ paper, quill, and ink.” In his messy handwriting he scribbled:

_This one doesn’t chat at all. I think you’ll like him better._

The second issue… the Garden was in a meadow today, the Graveyard nowhere to be seen. But Tom had sent Colin to him, so there must be a way. And since Colin was there, Colin must know.

Back to the atrium it was.

Colin was, naturally, right where Harry had left him. Harry lay down next to him, the grass tickling his feet and arms. The sun was peeking out from behind a cloud so that even when Harry closed his eyes, he could feel its warmth on his face.

Now came an odd process. To put himself to sleep… he knew this wasn’t how the others felt it, an almost mechanical process, a little like apparating. Harry himself didn’t need to sleep but he did sometimes for entertainment- to see the dreams of those who slept in his domain. A smile came to his face as a flower wrapped itself comfortingly around his ankle, an anchor for him to come back again if he felt scared of the strangeness of the other world. He didn’t need it now, but he used to.

He concentrated, he felt himself sinking into the earth, and when he opened his eyes again it was to blurry images coming slowly into focus. A laughing child. An excited puppy, dashing in and out of the room.

A home. Colin’s.

It was, admittedly, a shot in the dark. He couldn’t speak to the dreamers, but they could always see him when he visited. He hoped that Colin would be able to communicate.

Or better.

“Dennis,” Colin said lightly to the other child, looking up and seeing Harry immediately. “Do you have a question for me?”

It occurred to Harry after a second that Dennis could see him too. Harry gestured to Dennis, who came over and let Harry whisper into his ear.

Dennis whispered into Colin’s ear the message. Colin tried to say something to Harry but no words left his mouth. Harry thought it was a miracle Colin could communicate in the first place, likely because Colin had already woken up once and so wasn’t as tethered to the rules of the sleeper. Shrugging, Colin tried again, this time speaking to Dennis.

“I don’t know how I found my way here. He just told me to find you again and I did, so just, er, try that I guess. And good luck.”

Harry nodded, waved, and pulled on the weight on his ankle until he woke up again.

Tom Riddle Senior was also where Harry had left him, standing at the gates. Using the same voice he’d used to command him previously, Harry said, “Go to the Graveyard and deliver the note to the King of Skulls… your son.”

Without affirmation the sleeping man turned and ambled dreamily out of the gates of Harry’s Garden. Harry watched him go, disappearing slowly into the distant fields.

Harry could only hope that he reached his destination.

-

“Did you get my trade?” Harry called, running to the fence where Tom stood, their areas having aligned once more. A woman by the name of Susan had woken up only to be subject to a political assassination, and though the thought saddened him, he realised that this meant he could speak to Tom again.

Tom smiled at him. “I did. It was very enjoyable.”

“Not one for chatter?” Harry asked, slightly breathless and now all too aware of how smooth Tom was in comparison.

Tom tilted his head. “Perhaps I could make an exception, if your ‘chatter’ is worth it,” he replied.

Harry rolled his eyes. “Maybe it’ll be your chatter that isn’t worth it. How long do we have, do you know?”

“Susan will die soon, it’s how the Graveyard works, but I’ve left her alone so that we could have more time.”

“Okay…” Harry trailed off, suddenly lost for words. What do you actually say to a stranger who happens to be the only person you’ve properly spoken to in hundreds of years? “Er, what’s your favourite colour?”

Tom raised an eyebrow, as if disbelieving that Harry would ask such an inane question, but answered anyway. “Red. I find it… passionate. I appreciate passion. Yourself?”

“Green.” Harry gestured to his Garden, to the grass and the clovers and the wildflowers. “Constant. Comforting.” Then he shrugged and added, “Nice to look at.”

Tom looked amused. “Do you talk to them?”

“Them?”

“The plants. The sleepers.”

Harry shrugged again. “When they wake up, I guess. Most of it’s in my head. Why, do you talk to the dead?”

Tom made an aborted movement with his hand that Harry couldn’t translate. “No,” he said. “I… they make me uncomfortable.”

It was Harry’s turn to be surprised. “Uncomfortable? How long have you been the King of Skulls?”

Tom shook his head. “No, it’s nothing like that, I’ve been here for hundreds of years. There’s just something about them that unnerves me.”

Harry frowned. “Maybe it’s because you don’t talk to them, so you feel like you’re sharing your home with strangers.”

Tom’s forehead creased. “Why would you think-?”

“That was how it felt for me for a while, in the beginning at least,” Harry admitted. “I mean at least the Dursleys were familiar, and then Uncle Vernon choked me a little too hard for a little too long and suddenly I was confined to a paradise full of people I didn’t know. They made me uncomfortable back then, and I avoided them until one of them woke up.

“Rubeus Hagrid, his name was. By some strange stroke of luck he’d known my parents before they died, offered me memories of them. But he also believed in magic, and he helped me understand how to embrace this new role instead of fear it. I started to watch their dreams, spoke to them when they woke, made sure they would be comfortable while they slept. And eventually they became… like flowers, to me. To be cared for, appreciated, and not at all scared of… oh Merlin, I’m rambling- I’m not used to having someone to talk to, sorry.”

Tom was staring at him with an odd expression on his face. Harry’s face, he was sure, was bright red. To be caught reminiscing by someone he’d wanted to make a good impression on- maybe he _should_ start talking to the plants.

And Tom was still staring.

“You know what?” Harry said through his embarrassment. “I’m going to set you homework.”

_“Homework?”_

“Yes. Speak to one of your ghosts. At least once. And don’t look at me like that, I saw one floating by just now so I know they’re there.”

“Are you even allowed to set homework?” Tom said, feigning outrage. “I didn’t know that was something that could happen. Someone fetch me the rulebook.”

“We’re fairy tales, Tom. There is no rule book.”

Tom’s mouth curved into a half-smile, like Harry had just spoken something more profound than he’d meant. “If we weren’t fairy tales, if we were just- dare I say it, _ordinary_ people, what would you do?”

Harry paused, only too aware that Tom was watching him intently. “Maybe I would own a flower shop,” he said, a smile pulling at his mouth.

Tom’s smile widened, amused. “Maybe I’d be an undertaker. Or maybe...”  

But Harry didn’t find out what Tom might have been in a different life, for they began to shift away from each other, a distortion to the air blurring Tom from him. This time, instead of Harry’s Garden materialising in a ravine, it was Tom’s Graveyard that departed, leaving Harry alone on the edge of a creek.

Harry bent over his fence to look into the water, water that belonged to the living world. He formed an unstemmed amaryllis in his hand and dropped it into the water. It rested on the top, the water rippling lazily outwards.

He wondered if anyone would wander along after he was gone and see the flower. Take it, maybe. Remember it. He wondered if the flower would stay floating on the surface after Harry had disappeared into smoke and mist and bluebells.

He wondered if anything he ever did would last, whether he would ever be allowed to have something permanent besides himself and the Garden that would never speak back to him.

A week later a corpse arrived at his gates, bearing the message:

_I believe, in another world, I would be a spell crafter. But for now, I am content to stay in this world with you; your chatter is bearable._

_Until next time, hmm?_

-

_I saw a carnation today. It reminded me of you._

_-_

_I have tried to speak with a few of the ghosts. The only one who does not immediately disappear at my approach is Moaning Myrtle. It is frustrating to the extreme, and I question your and my sanity daily, but I am trying for you._

_-_

_Don’t try for me, Tom. Try for you. Also, you’ll never guess what the flower in this sleeper’s hand is called._

_-_

_You’re right. Shockingly, I have no idea. Is it heliotrope?_

_-_

_It was myrtle!_

_-_

_You’re hilarious._

_I miss you._

_-_

_You have Myrtle, don’t you?_

_-_

_It’s not quite the same._

_-_

Something was wrong with the pair of blonds. They lay next to the zinnia patch, and as Harry approached the zinnias waved in the breeze as if to take his attention away from the bodies.

The older one, Harry realised as he knelt down, was fine. Due to wake up any day now, really. The younger one was supposed to wake up at around the same point, but something had changed. His state had changed.

Harry searched for a date and all he came up with was forever.

“Oh, Cedric,” Harry murmured to the boy who looked the same age as him but was in reality far, far younger. “I’m so sorry.”

If Cedric heard him, Harry did not know. He looked regretfully to Cedric’s father (Amos, the Garden told him). He decided that he would give them time before he moved Cedric to the glade where the unwaking slept. Maybe the change would reverse itself.

-

_I wouldn’t know._

_-_

The rivers had flooded from the rain, littering water lilies onto the paths.

Today was a bad day. That happened sometimes, when the enormity of his duty consumed him and left him haunted. Today it was the isolation that was getting to him; isolation and desperation and bitterness engulfing him like a sapling suffocated by weeds. The taller trees offered Harry shelter, but today he liked the feel of the droplets on his skin. It purified him somehow from the guilt that came with watching over the injured and the doomed.

He looked to the gates and at those tarrying outside. They were drowning, and all Harry could think was that he could see Tom again, and he loved it, and he hated it.

He went to the fence next to where Tom would surely materialise as he had the past few times they’d met. He’d seen Tom again a few times since he’d set Tom the ‘homework’, and while Tom reported slow progress of being able to speak to those he shared a graveyard with, Harry found himself increasingly lonely without his or anyone else’s company.

And increasingly jealous of the ghosts in Tom’s Graveyard, for although Tom’s company could be sometimes downright insulting, it was mutual and joking and Harry _craved_ it.

But when he felt those pangs of bitter wanting, he just made sure to be extra enthusiastic in his next note, for he knew that if he was jealous of Tom’s interactions it must mean that Tom was on the right track, and that was infinitely more important.

Harry shifted, standing ankles-deep in a growing puddle. When he was mortal, he knew that he would have been uncomfortable with the wet, but he had since learned to let go of such petty insecurities (and replaced them with bigger ones). Nothing in his garden could hurt him, so there was no point in avoiding it. It was just another way of immersing himself in his land, and his land was as close to a constant companion as he could have.

“Do you take sugar in your tea?” A smooth voice interrupted his thoughts, making him jump.

“Tom! Er, tea?” Harry looked up to see Tom standing on the other side with two teacups in his hands and an umbrella suspended above him.

“Dreadful weather, isn’t it? I felt like tea was an appropriate solution. Sugar?”

“Um, sure. Yeah. Okay.”

Tom handed a teacup to him, and when Harry reached over and took it easily he realised something new.

“We’re a lot closer than we were last time,” he noted, taking a sip.

“Yes, we are,” Tom agreed, a light smile playing on his face. He lifted his free hand to bring it up to Harry’s face. “It means I can do things like this,” he said, brushing Harry’s cheek and jaw before letting his hand drop. He left a line of fire in his wake, and by the look on Tom’s face Harry guessed Tom knew exactly what his touch had done to Harry.

Harry couldn’t help noticing that the last time someone else had touched his face, he had been alive, and it had hurt.

“Um… the tea’s very good,” Harry stammered.

Tom smirked. “I’m glad.”

“Do you do this often? Drink and eat, I mean. ‘Cause I don’t.”

“Not often, no. But seeing you is a special occasion. And speaking of special, I have finally had a civil conversation with Myrtle that doesn’t involve her flying through me in a temper tantrum.”

“I imagine that was difficult for her, dealing with you of all people,” Harry said, and then laughed at Tom’s expression. “Come on Tom, I’m kidding. Congratulations!” Harry said, beaming and trying not to be jealous, once again, that Tom had someone else to talk to. Harry technically had Colin, but he knew instinctively- just like he knew approximately how long his sleepers would sleep for- that he was not supposed to meddle with their dreams.

Tom was talking about Myrtle’s conversation and he should have been listening, but Harry was struggling with a dark, gnawing twist in his chest, and then felt such a sudden overwhelming wave of loneliness and jealousy that he had to turn away, muttering, “Sorry,” and hiding his face.

“Harry? Look, I’m not _that_ bad at conversation,” Tom said, his sarcasm not entirely covering up the confusion in his voice. But Harry couldn’t reciprocate.

“Harry?” This time, Tom’s voice was concerned. Strong. Harry should be stronger than this, had tried to make himself stronger because he _knew_ he’d have to deal with this eventually. Why did Tom have to appear on a bad day?

“Give me a minute,” he said shortly, trying to hold back- hold back what he didn’t know. Tears? Merlin, he hoped not. Of all the times for the straw to break the thestral’s back, this was quite possibly the worst, wasting what little company he had by being selfish.

Fine. He was fine. This would pass, and he would be back to normal in no time.

“Harry, turn around.”

Deep breaths. He couldn’t look Tom in the face, for fear that Tom would find him pathetic, unworthy, overdramatic. And yet Tom was being such a good friend, and Harry was being an awful one, now and always because even though Tom was giving him everything he didn’t know he’d wanted Harry still wanted _more_.

“Harry- damn it-” a muffled sound, a hand on Harry’s shoulder turning him around, Harry’s feet splashing the puddle. The teacup in Harry’s hand flying out and smashing on the fence. Rain.

Harry stared at the mess. “I broke your teacup,” he said softly, and then burst into tears.

Strong arms pulled him into a hug, and since when had Tom been so tall? Belatedly, Harry realised Tom had climbed onto the wall of the Graveyard to get to him, and Harry could do nothing but clutch at Tom in return.

Tom’s hand was on Harry’s neck. Harry’s hand was in Tom’s shirt. No one had given him a hug since he was one year old. He hadn’t realised how much he needed it.

“Harry, what is it?” Tom murmured against his ear. “Are you alright?”

“Peachy,” Harry sniffled, wishing he had a time-turner to do-over the day.

But Tom continued in that gentle voice. “Has something happened?”

“I’m sorry,” Harry said. Tom’s noise of protest suggested that in any other situation Tom might have swatted at him. “I just… when you’re not here, I… I just wish you didn’t leave,” he tried to explain.

Tom pulled back, looking into his eyes, his hands firm on Harry’s shoulders. His expression was more tender than it had ever been, and the fire ever-burning in his eyes was somehow tinged with an anguish that mirrored Harry’s own. “I don’t _want_ to leave,” he whispered. “I wish I could stay with you. I wish we could be together.”

Tom delicately brushed his fingers against Harry’s face, not unlike the first time but with completely different intentions now. Tom caught Harry’s tears and merged them with the rain water.

“Step out of the puddle, Harry Potter...” Tom said, pulling him closer, guiding him so they were both sitting on the edges of their lands. Tom’s hand was still on his cheek.

Harry barely dared to breathe.

“You belong with me instead." 

Harry was drenched, but even though Tom had summoned an umbrella to keep himself dry he pulled Harry flush against his body. Tom tilted his head and leaned in... they were so close, _so close_ , and Harry ached at the softness of Tom’s hand on his face. Tom’s lips would be softer. Tom’s love would be softer. Harry leaned in too, his eyes fluttering closed. Their noses brushed; their lips touched-

Harry fell to the ground, a dull pain in his side from where it hit. He stood, confused. Tom, too, was lifting himself from the ground on the other side. But the gap was widening between them.

“No!” Tom yelled, furious for the first time at their separation.

Harry watched as the Graveyard disappeared with Tom throwing himself against the wall in frustration. The teacup was still broken on the ground. Harry touched his hand to his lips.

It was still raining.

-

_Not willing to kill one of your charges so I can see you again, are you?_

Harry stared at the note, memorising to himself Tom’s elegant handwriting and the confirmation that Tom wanted him.

The bad day had passed, taking Harry’s mood with it and leaving embarrassment over the incident behind in its wake. The Garden was now on the edge of a dark, forbidding forest on a hill that looked down over a village. The gates, however, led deeper into the forest.

Harry’s love for Tom was a dangerous thing, he thought, for it was almost tempting to do what Tom suggested. Almost, but not quite.

Today was the day that Amos Diggory would wake up, but it appeared that his son was not so lucky. Cedric continued to sleep, and the Garden persisted that he would do so forever. Harry did not know what caused the change- something outside the garden, most likely- but he was under obligation to release Amos alone.

Maybe he had forgotten. Hopefully he would understand. They usually did.

_Unfortunately I’m not so cruel. But the longer we are apart, the more I entertain the idea. I hope it ends soon._

_Sorry for being so pathetic. It’s been lonely here. It happens._

Harry placed the message in the hand of the sleeper and urged him to find Tom. Only shortly after did he feel Amos’ time near. He returned to the atrium.

Harry sat cross-legged next to a patch of marigolds, weaving them into an untidy flower crown to have something to do and growing new ones in their place, all the while keeping an eye on Amos Diggory. It was not long before he woke, but long enough that Harry was able to put the final marigold in place before Amos had the presence of mind to stand.

The first thing Amos Diggory said was, “Where am I?” but the second was, “Where the hell is my son?”

Harry decided to tackle the first question first. “You’re in my Garden, sir. They call me the King of Flowers. We’re in the Garden of the sleeping. You suffered a nasty fall- I assume- and have been asleep for some time.”

Amos gestured angrily with his hand. “I don’t care what they call you, I want to know what you’ve done with my son!”

Harry frowned. “He’s still sleeping but I’m sure he’ll wake up soon,” he said, trying to keep the defensiveness out of his voice. “If you’ll just come with me-”

Amos actually laughed at him. “I’m staying right here until you show me my boy!”

Harry only barely kept the bite out of his voice as he replied, “In that case I guess I’ll have to drag his body here. Wait just a moment, I’ll try not to get him _too_ scuffed up from the ground-”

“Well by all means bring me to him!”

Harry found he preferred Tom Riddle Senior’s sleepwalking body following him around over Amos Diggory at his heels with barely contained self-righteous anger. But all the same, Harry led him to where Cedric’s body lay.

Except Cedric’s body was not there. Harry stood silently, confused.

“Where’s my boy?!” Amos choked, quickly deducing something was wrong.

“I don’t...” Harry said, but cut himself off when a prickle of dread overcame him.

“What have you done to him?!” Amos accused again, jumping forward to confront him. Harry backed up a few paces.

The message he had sent to Tom earlier that day… he had not noticed, but he remembered now… he told a sleeper to follow him, one that would never wake, but he had not paid attention to just who it was. But he felt more and more certain with each passing second that the boy who had taken Harry’s message to Tom had been Cedric.

“He’s not here,” Harry whispered, and then cleared his throat and his head. “He’s not here,” he repeated more firmly. “He’s gone.”

“Gone where? Bring him back!”

 _“I can’t!”_ Harry yelled, throwing his arms up in frustration. _“You_ both fell. _You_ rendered yourselves unconscious. I’m just the guy who looks after you all until you wake up!” And he sent Cedric to die. But he wasn’t going to say that.

Amos looked around animatedly. “What do you mean you look after us? You must not have looked after my Cedric! Where has he gone?”

“Out of the Garden,” Harry said, forcibly calming his tone. “Here, I can show you the gates.”

He turned before Amos could protest, and Amos could do nothing but follow Harry to the gates of the Garden.

“My boy is out there?” he said skeptically, looking into the dark forest.

“He left the Garden through these gates,” Harry confirmed. “I sent him out with a message.”

Amos turned to him suspiciously. “But you said, you said he was still sleeping,” he stepped towards Harry. Again Harry stepped back.

“He was sleepwalking. I sent him somewhere with a message, out there.” He pointed into the forest.

Amos started into the forest, and as soon as passed the gates Harry relaxed. He could see the air ripple around the fence, one of the tell-tale signs that the Garden was about to move.

“Wait,” he called to Amos, feeling he should at least tell Amos the truth about what had happened to his son now that Harry was in no danger.

Amos looked almost scared to turn. Harry couldn’t blame him.

“One more thing. The place I sent Cedric-” Harry didn’t want to say Graveyard. “I sent him to the domain of the King of Skulls. If you ask around I’m sure someone can tell you where that is.” And what it meant.  

Amos’ expression coloured with concern, and suspicion once more. ‘Skulls’ was foreboding, certainly, and Amos seemed to see that something was off. However, he only made it halfway back to the gates before the mist came, swallowing up the Garden and releasing it into a snowy cavern.

Harry turned away.

-

It was raining again the next time Harry saw Tom. It was fitting, he thought, as it was almost like they were carrying on where they left off the time before.

Given this, it was ironic that Harry did not anticipate the first thing Tom did, which was to pull Harry in by the front of his shirt and kiss him like his life depended on it.

But that was what happened anyway.

Tom kissed like he spoke; intense, well, and straight to the point. Harry kissed like he knew how, which was to say, barely. It caught him off guard, the heat of Tom’s mouth and the strange care Tom took with him. It overwhelmed Harry’s senses, and by the time he realised his hands were clutching Tom’s arms and he should _probably_ reciprocate, the kiss was over.

Tom was grinning.

“I have been wanting to do that for quite some time,” he said, brushing the hair back from Harry’s face. Tom always managed to turn Harry’s face bright red- Harry would have to work harder to do the same to him, if it was even possible.

“I’ve been wanting you to do that for some time too,” Harry replied. He noticed that his hands were still on Tom’s arms. He did not know whether to keep them there or move them away, and while he deliberated over this dilemma, Tom was leaning in to capture his lips once more.

This kiss was softer. More manageable. Harry kissed back this time, and how was it possible (for Tom was always so much more put together than Harry was) that Tom seemed as out of breath as he was? How was it possible that Tom yearned as Harry did to pull ever closer, to hold on and never let go, damn the rulebook and everyone else? How were those beautiful baritone moans coming from Tom’s mouth, when Harry was the one being utterly devoured and seared with this impossible intimacy down to his very soul?

The damned fence was their only barrier, and Harry had to regrettably pull away when it dug too painfully into his hip, his head bowed and slightly dizzy. Reality returned in a breath of cold air and the rain drumming down upon them both. Tom hadn’t brought an umbrella this time, but it seemed neither of them cared.  

“Tom…” Harry whispered like a secret, for he felt that said more than any other words could or would in Harry’s current state.

“I think I’m in love with you,” Tom admitted. He sounded as amazed as Harry felt. A finger at his chin lifted Harry’s head so they could see each other’s faces; Tom looked debauched and Harry could not stop staring.

“I…” Harry replied eloquently. He wanted to believe Tom’s words so badly but the self-doubt pushed forward enough to ask, “Are you sure?”

Tom frowned at this, contemplative. He sat on the fence and gestured for Harry to do the same. It was wet, but Harry barely felt it.

“I was worried for a while that what I felt was just... craving company,” Tom said, not looking Harry in the eyes but gazing at something in the distance. “But Colin annoyed me far too much and Myrtle, while the only and therefore best company I have without you here- I find it’s just not the same as you. You’re different. You’re mine.”

Harry grinned, nudging his head against Tom’s in silent agreement. “I spoke to a human earlier too,” he said suddenly, remembering the incident from a few days ago. “I can’t compare company craving, though, because he was actually shouting at me most of the time.”

“Shouting at you?” Tom asked, a slight edge to his voice. Harry took his hand to relax him.

“He and his son were asleep. He woke up. His son didn’t. I also made a mistake- I didn’t notice- the last letter I sent you? It was Cedric Diggory, his son, who took it. I didn’t realise I’d sent _him_ before it was too late, and his father noticed.” Harry paused, remembering the look of despair in Amos’ eyes. “Cedric was supposed to wake up, you see,” he said quietly. “They were supposed to wake up at the same time. But something went wrong with Cedric. I thought if I just left him there it would right itself but then I didn’t notice and sent him to you- not that I blame you or anything- I mean it’s my fault I-”

“It’s not your fault,” Tom said firmly. “You only send me the ones who will never wake up anyway. There was no hope for Cedric.” He paused. “I trust he did not hurt you in any way?”

“No. He was threatening and all but he didn’t touch me. I’ve just, it’s stuck with me. I feel like I should have been able to do more for him, you know what I mean? I… what if I left him all on his own? I took his _son_ from him, they were supposed to wake up _together!”_

_“Harry.”_

Once more, Harry had gone into hysterics, leaving Tom to clean up the mess. “Sorry. I don’t mean to rant at you.”

Tom cupped Harry’s face, bending down to kiss him chastely on the mouth.

“Harry, many things happen that were not ‘supposed’ to. Were we supposed to end up here, I wonder? Does it matter?” Tom kissed him again and was silent for some time. Harry got the impression that he was struggling to say something, so he waited.

“I intended to kill my father,” Tom said eventually. “He abandoned my mother when she was pregnant with me. She died in childbirth, I never knew her. I worked for a long time to find out who I was descended from, sure I was meant for more than the drab life of a poor orphan. When I finally found my father, I expected more… But what I _did_ find was _disgust_ on his face at my existence, at my magic... I was so angry. I tried to kill him, and I killed his parents. When he disappeared, I assumed it was magic, and I did not attempt to murder him again.”

“He disappeared?” Harry asked.

“That’s the part that surprises you? Well, I suppose- yes, he did disappear. Into a cloud of fog, in fact. I believe a bluebell was left behind in his place.”

“A bluebell,” Harry repeated, almost smiling at the thought. The mist always did remind him of bluebells. “How fitting.”

“You were partly right about why the ghosts disturb me,” Tom continued. “What you could not have known, and what I realised after the incident, is that death... was my greatest fear. I was, for the lack of a more dignified term, so _scared_ of death that I eventually found a way to split my soul so that I could not permanently die.”

“Horcruxes?” Harry clarified, with no small amount of horror at the thought. He’d heard about horcruxes in the dreams of some of the darker wizards who entered his garden, though none ever attempted it. The idea that _Tom_ would... Harry’s hand tightened on Tom’s subconsciously.

“Yes.” Tom was not smiling. “But something went wrong. It didn’t work, and I ended up here. I suppose I got the immortality I had been searching for in the end… now, of course, I’m glad my attempt didn’t work.”

“So am I!” Harry exclaimed, drawing a smile from Tom.

“We both ended up better off here, I think. I was relieved of my obsession with death- in a way- and you were relieved of your abusive family-”

Harry’s eyebrows knitted together. “I don’t recall telling you that,” he said, casting his mind back to their previous conversations.

Tom shook his head, dismissive. “You didn’t, not explicitly, but it was easy to work out. You told me your uncle choked you ‘too hard’ which suggests there was an amount of hard that _wasn’t_ too hard, and similarly ‘too long’ meaning that you had been choked for a shorter amount of time… the thought sickens me. But I’m right, am I not?”

Harry inclined his head. The movement caused a couple of droplets to fall between them. “I’m surprised you remember my phrasing. _I_ barely remember my phrasing.”

Tom smirked, tracing Harry’s cheekbone with his thumb. “I remember everything you’ve ever said to me.”

Harry was torn between smiling and pouting. He chose pouting. “Well now I just feel inadequate,” he joked.  

Tom laughed. “Trust me, you are anything but. My point, however, is this: was that all supposed to happen? If not, then who cares about what was supposed to instead? I have you with me. I would not have it another way. And if so, then the logical conclusion is that what happened to the Diggorys was fate, and you need not worry on it.”

As Tom kissed Harry again, Harry felt the fence move beneath them ever so slightly. He pulled away prematurely with a small sigh.

“There’s one thing I disagree with you on,” Harry said to Tom’s questioning look. “I would have it another way. I’d have it so that we were never forced apart like this.”

A muscle in Tom’s jaw flexed in his shared irritation, and in that moment there was nothing Harry wanted more than to study every plane of Tom’s body, from his jaw to his hands to his-

But Harry only had time to sigh at the feel of Tom’s soft lips kissing the rainwater from his neck once more before they were torn away from each other.

“Until next time,” Tom said, albeit reluctantly, trying to placate Harry or himself Harry could not tell.

“Next time,” Harry repeated as Tom was obscured by mist and rain.

Harry started down the poppy-laden path to his throne, soaked to the bone. The taller trees offered Harry shelter, and he accepted it when he realised he was shivering. The lilies at his feet enclosed him in a cocoon when he sank onto the throne, giving him a blanket and shelter from the chill that he was not used to feeling.

He closed his eyes, felt a strange squeezing sensation, and opened them to see the world of the sleepers.

-

_‘Cruel’ denotes causing pain and suffering to others. Is it suffering if they do not feel it and are not aware of it happening to them? Either way, I can’t imagine you being cruel to anyone._

_-_

_Having never tried it myself, I’ve got no idea whether dying in your sleep is painful. I’m not particularly eager to test it. Also, you’d be surprised… and I find it easy to imagine you being cruel to anyone but me._

_-_

_You’re right- I would be surprised, I am perfectly capable of being cruel to people, and I would sooner end myself than cause you pain._

-

The rain had stopped, but a certain dampness still lingered in the air.

Harry probably made a strange image floating a few inches above the ground to avoid the wet, but as there was no-one around to see, he didn’t care. So far he had adorned a third of his sleepers with a chain of rainflowers and he was determined to see his self-created task to its end.

However, when a prickling feeling under his skin alerted him to something unexpected at the gates of his Garden, he could not resist setting down the chain he was holding to go and investigate.

There was something orange hovering in the middle of the path, not quite over the threshold into Harry’s Garden. As Harry edged closer he realised it was an orange flower, and when he was closer still he identified it as an orange lily. There was an odd sheen to it, an odd glow. Harry found himself inexplicably drawn to it.

Had Tom sent it? Tom was the only person who had ever managed or cared to send him anything, and he knew sending flowers was considered romantic in many cultures. It would be a sweet gesture.

But there was no message with the flower, which was unusual to Tom’s style. And an orange lily was a weird flower to send to a lover, though Harry supposed it could be interpreted to mean passion- he could forgive Tom for this mistake as Tom knew close to nothing about flowers.

Harry stopped his advance on the very edge of his Garden, knowing from experience that he would not be able to go further. He held his hand out so his fingers were almost touching the petals.

It was a lot of effort to go to for a flower- making it glow, making it hover? Surely Tom would have sent it with a person instead, unless he didn’t want to involve anyone else in the gesture? But there was nothing to suggest that he no longer wanted to trade inhabitants, in fact Harry still needed to reply to Tom’s last message. And what was that slightly reflective sheen around the flower?

No, Harry had to conclude that Tom did not send him this. The question was, who did? Since it wasn’t Tom, the meaning couldn’t be passion, unless he had a stalker he wasn’t aware of. No, it was more likely that whoever sent it intended its more common meaning- hatred.

The draw was stronger than ever, and Harry could barely resist the mystery of the orange lily and its sender. Hatred- who hated him?

He reached to take it by the stem, and too late he realised what the sheen was: a glamour. There was one person Harry knew who had reason to hate him, and that was Amos Diggory. As soon as his fingers touched the stem his hand was forced to close painfully around what the glamour was concealing.

But orange lilies didn’t have thorns. This flower was heavily modified, mutated. Harry even felt sorry for it- but he could not let it go, no matter how hard he tried.

The thorns pierced his skin like thick needles of pain. Harry stepped backwards, wavering. Something was entering his system. The burn of the thorns was not normal. His hand was wet with blood, a warning sign if he ever saw one, since he did not remember the last time he had bled.

At his touch the flower let out a raspy whisper, a message from its sender.

_“You will suffer as you made him suffer.”_

“Help!” he cried out, but no-one heard him.

There was a fuzziness around the edge of his vision now. His veins were pulsing with whatever toxin had entered his body. Merlin, it _hurt,_ and Harry was just stumbling backwards still.

He mumbled spell after spell but nothing touched the flower. Was this what it was like to fall asleep in his Garden? He hoped not- with every passing second the pain grew, until it felt like his hand was being stabbed repeatedly with white hot knives, the blazing poison dragging his body down.

No. This was unnatural. Intentional.

If only he could see Tom! He would surely know a way out of this mess Harry had gotten himself into.

Eventually the only things Harry could think about was the _pain_ and how he longed for Tom, for death, for _anything_ but this. Sleep would be better. But sleep was the end-goal, the whole point; his vision clouded, his head pounded, his body collapsed. He wasn’t dying. He was being put to sleep. And he knew instinctively that he would not wake.

He would be leaving Tom... leaving his sleepers...

Clinging to the last of his consciousness, he used every ounce of energy he had left to reach every area of the garden with one purpose in mind, one that he had never achieved before but _had_ to achieve right now, even if it killed him.

He woke the sleepers.

And then he slept.

-

_Do wizards dream of magical sheep?_

_-_

_That’s twice you haven’t responded. You always respond. Has something happened?_

_-_

_Harry, are you receiving my messages?_

_-_

_If this is some sort of joke, it’s not funny. You’re scaring me._

_-_

_Harry, please. Give me anything. Even a blank piece of paper. I need to know you’re okay._

_Please._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed! Feel free to leave a comment, and the next part should be up within the next few weeks.


	2. He No Longer Sleeps

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry shows no signs of waking, and Tom searches for answers.

It had been months since Tom had seen Harry last, but that was not unusual. What was unusual was the silence.

Since he met Harry, Tom had grown accustomed to the notes they sent each other, always waiting for a response and always knowing that he would receive one. Sure that no matter how long he went without being able to _see_ Harry, he was never alone.

He was not so sure of this now.

Tom had not stopped writing notes to Harry every so often on the off chance that Harry would respond, but he grew more hopeless- and quite frankly, panicked- as time went on. He couldn’t fathom a reason as to why Harry wasn’t writing back. He could have run out of people who would never wake, but then wouldn’t Harry have noticed this and mentioned it earlier?

There was the possibility that Harry could have just lost interest in him… but Tom refused to think so lowly of the man he was in love with. Plus, Tom had seen what loneliness did to Harry; even if the possibility were true, he wouldn’t voluntarily cut himself off from his only source of human interaction.

Myrtle and Helena (for Tom had managed to befriend another ghost in the time that Harry had been silent, a feat that Tom was _dying_ to tell Harry) did an admirable job of attempting to cheer Tom up, but the more time passed without any word from Harry, the more agitated Tom grew, until his company wasn’t even remotely pleasant and Myrtle and Helena kept to themselves instead of incurring his ire.

So on one miserable day when Helena appeared next to him in a blur, eyes wide and hair billowing behind her, Tom knew something had changed.

Harry?

With a mingled feeling of both hope and dread, he followed Helena out of his mausoleum and through the maze of graves. Instead of leading him to the wall where he and Harry usually spoke, she led him to the gates.

But his gates now opened into Harry’s Garden. And what was more, there was a _crowd_ of people waiting just inside.

“Your majesty!” called one familiar voice; the voice of Colin Creevey, the boy who had sparked Harry and Tom’s first meeting.

“Where’s Harry?” Tom asked without preamble as Colin came into view, weaving through the crowd to face Tom.

Colin bit his lip. “That’s… nevermind. Come on, you can see him if you follow us.”

Tom’s eyes narrowed. “Can I even enter his Garden? Especially while he’s not here to invite me in personally?” And speaking of Harry, _why wasn’t he here?_ The feeling of dread only grew.

Colin shrugged and made as if to grab Tom’s hand before aborting the movement- a wise decision. “The rules are different now. You’ll be able to come in. Otherwise the Garden wouldn’t make it so easy for you, would it?”

Tom could not argue with this judgement, knowing little about the sentience of Harry’s domain. He just needed to see Harry. “Take me to him,” he said, and Colin looked only too happy to oblige. As Tom stepped from his Graveyard into Harry’s Garden, there was a ripple in the air and the atmosphere seemed to change. Tom got the distinct impression that the Garden… was in mourning? But that couldn’t be right at all.

The crowd parted for Colin and Tom, and Tom turned his attention to the strangers. Except they weren’t all strangers; some he recognised from his own Graveyard, as the dead he’d given to Harry as gifts. They were supposed to be sleeping. _Everyone_ here was supposed to be sleeping. Why was everyone awake?

_Where was Harry?_

The large crowd followed closely behind Tom and Colin as they walked the path- a beautiful, idyllic path on any normal day- towards their unknown destination. This path, unlike any of the others that occasionally crisscrossed with it, was lined with what appeared to be withering poppies.

As the crowd moved, a gap became apparent in their midst as if something was blocking their path so they had to move around it. Tom stilled, allowing the others to pass by ahead- clearly they knew his destination- so that he could see what had hindered them. When the throng eventually cleared, Tom saw it. On the ground in front of the gate, a shadow of a person that was not there, lying on the floor. If this had been a muggle television show, there would have been a white outline around this shape- but Tom did not know _why_ he knew this information, only that the Graveyard had chosen to share it with him. Like Harry’s intimate knowledge of plants, Tom’s knowledge of the outer world, and specifically of Death, came from the domain he was chained to.

But not, evidently, chained to now.

What was the shape? He asked himself repeatedly, decidedly ignoring the one possibility that seemed most likely. It could not be Harry, surely. Harry was in the other direction, or so Colin had said. Then what had made this impression on the ground? If it had been on a patch of grass, Tom might have thought it looked like the impression of something that had laid there long enough to have killed the grass beneath it.

It was, in fact, as if the very ground underneath the shadow had withered away and died underneath, which would make sense if the ground was grass and if the shape was in fact a shadow, blocking out the sunlight. But this was clearly not the case. Remaining puzzled, Tom concluded that this was a mystery for after he had found Harry.

He turned away to find Colin waiting for him. Though the boy had watched him, and though he had a knowing look in his eye, he did not explain it. He just turned and gestured for Tom to follow him. Feeling somewhat degraded for being directed by a mere child, Tom nonetheless complied.

“We thought it would help him if he was on his throne so we moved him,” Colin told Tom while they walked, as if that was supposed to make sense to him. “It’s a good sign that you’re not asleep yet, the Garden likes you! I think. I don’t actually know how to interpret the plants or the land, only Harry knows how to do that, but it’s not like he can translate for us-”

 _“What_ has happened to Harry?” Tom asked, in the calmest voice he could muster. It wasn’t very calm.

“... He’s kind of sleeping,” Colin said after a pause, fidgeting with his fingers and not elaborating further.

Tom narrowed his eyes and Colin recoiled.

‘Sleeping’ couldn’t have been the entirety of the issue. Harry had slept before on multiple occasions _without_ the side effects of waking all of his sleepers up and neglecting to respond to Tom for months. Colin was _lying_ and Tom _knew it._

He would have demanded that Colin explain himself, had he not been distracted by the large marble gazebo that the path they’d been following led into. Inside, at the centre of a large field ringed by trees and scattered with sunflowers, rose a giant redwood that reached so high its top wasn’t inside the gazebo but above it, through a large gilded hole in the middle of the ceiling. Merged into the bottom of the redwood was a set of marble steps up to a dais. Through the hole in the ceiling, the rays of light filtered through the branches of the redwood, and one of the rays managed to reach the dais in such a way that Tom could see him, illuminated almost ethereally in a natural, fragile gold.

On the dais, on his throne, was Harry. There were lilies wrapped around his ankles, hands, and torso as if binding him there. Indeed, the way his head lolled to the side, it appeared the lilies were the only thing keeping Harry sitting upright.

Tom hadn’t realised he was running until he reached the steps. The crowd parted for him and he barely paused, climbing the stone as fast as he could to reach Harry’s side. A crackle beneath his feet caused him to hesitate as he climbed the final step, and he looked down to find the notes Tom had written for Harry spread at his feet.

“We thought that if he woke up, notes from you would be the first thing he’d want to see,” Colin said quietly, ascending the steps at a much more reserved pace. The sound reached Tom through the echoing acoustics of the vast hall and faded just as quickly, giving way once more to the silence. Tom swallowed, braced himself, and raised his gaze to Harry’s limp form.

He should have been beautiful. Objectively, he _was_ beautiful, framed by flowers and light. But Tom was not being objective, and the idea that in this state Harry was unresponsive and unwaking made the image positively horrifying instead. Harry’s expression was twisted into something pained even in sleep, and Tom’s eyes were drawn to his hand, which was covered in dried blood and clutching the stem of a flower Tom couldn’t identify.

“How long has he been like this?” Tom asked, though he thought he knew.

“Months,” Colin replied. Tom nodded.

“He hasn’t woken once?”

A silence, presumably Colin shaking his head before realising that Tom was not going to look at him. “Not once. It’s never happened before. We’re… we’re scared, your majesty. Can you help him?”

“I will do everything in my power to bring him back,” Tom said, and meant it.

_Do wizards dream of magical sheep?_

Tom shook his head.  

The first issue was the flower. Tom gestured to Harry’s hand to vanish the blood and knelt down to get a better look. Touching Harry’s wrist was both comforting and disturbing, for although Harry’s skin was warm with life, he was too easy to move, like a ragdoll or a puppet. Tom turned Harry’s hand around to see the flower and its thorns which were embedded into his palm. A prodding of his magic confirmed Tom’s suspicions; there were toxins in the flower that must have entered Harry’s body through the thorns. Using magic was of little use in removing the thorns, though, for as Tom tried to tug the flower away, Harry increased his grip on it, prompting more blood to ooze from his fist.

Harry needed to let go of the thorns, and to do that Harry needed to wake up… but in order to wake up, Harry needed to let go of the thorns. Clenching his own fist in frustration, Tom stood.

 _“Ennervate,”_ Tom tried, but naturally it did nothing. He hissed, irritated. “Have any of you tried anything?” Tom asked Colin and the crowd below that was just standing there waiting. He would have to tell them to leave.

One of the members of the crowd spoke, but Tom could not make out which one. “The bowtruckles tried to pull the flower away by hand but it didn’t do anything.”

Of course it didn’t.

“How did this happen?” Tom snapped. “Who did this to him?”

Colin looked down at the other sleepers, who shook their heads, and then back to Tom. “I don’t know. We found him with the lily in his hand asleep and he hasn’t changed since or given us _any_ sign!”

Tom had gotten that far on his own already. He took a deep breath to calm himself, and replayed Colin’s contribution in his head. “A lily, you said? That’s what that flower is?”

Colin shrugged. “Yes? Is that helpful?”

Tom frowned. “That depends. Is it important? Does Harry like lilies?” He should know this information, damn it. He should _know._

Colin gestured helplessly. “I don’t know! I barely spoke to him! Some of us have tried to contact him by sleeping but just like before, we can’t really talk to each other. We couldn’t even see him properly, there was some weird kind of magic in the way. I’m not even sure he knows he’s asleep!”

Which was bad, because if anyone would know how to manipulate the Garden it would be Harry. Colin’s exclamation echoed through the cavern, and the silence that followed was hollow and empty.

He needed start over with the facts that he knew… about what happened months ago, before Harry stopped replying to his notes.

They had been talking of cruelty, and how cruel it was or wasn’t to kill the eternal sleepers in order to relay messages. And Harry had spoken of- what was his name again, Creden-? No, _Cedric-_ Cedric, and how he had sent Cedric to Tom with one of his letters because the boy would never wake, and how his father…

… Tom tilted his head, slowly.

… Could it really be that simple?

There was an easy way to find out, of course, seeing as he had the boy of the hour right there for the picking in his Graveyard.

Tom all but flew from the gazebo, kicking the notes from beneath his feet and leaving them fluttering to the ground like a thousand wings in his wake. Harry wouldn’t need them now anyway.

“Make sure the Graveyard and the Garden stay intact _at all costs,”_ Tom demanded to those who trailed after him. “I will _not_ lose this chance to save him because of any damned rules.” The plants in the Garden shifted from the path and out of his way as he ran, as if in agreement. Of course, the Garden would want its caretaker back as much as anyone else. It had better not get in his way.

The ghosts of the Graveyard were waiting for him when he reached the gates, unwilling to cross the border but curious about the commotion. Their wispy forms were not as comforting as they should have been, or would have been were Tom not yearning for Harry, whose essence permeated the Garden and everything in it, leaving Tom’s Graveyard wanting. Myrtle and Helena were at the very front, and it was to them that he said:

“Take me to Cedric.”

-

The Diggory boy was laid to rest with the rest of the gifts Harry had sent him, in an area near the centre where the fog wasn’t quite as thick, and where the headstones were dotted with tiny buds rather than weeds.

Tom had not bothered to speak to Cedric before claiming him, too eager to read Harry’s words and too dismissive of the sleeping boy to care for anything he had to say, and so he had not returned as a ghost. This _should_ have meant that Tom could not speak to him, but Tom was nothing if not extremely goddamn powerful, and this was _his_ domain in the end.

The laws of his land would bow to him, not the other way around.

And so he struck the ground of Cedric’s grave, ignoring the tinge of fear that came from disturbing the dead, and brought down the air to claw the dirt away until Cedric’s coffin, and then his corpse, was exposed to him.

Tom reached down and hauled the boy out with his hands rather than with magic, and the moment Tom touched his skin his eyes snapped open and he gasped out dusty, ragged breaths. His first in months.

Cedric’s face might have been rotted and decomposed had he not been in Tom’s Graveyard, where the dead were preserved perfectly within their tombs, a fate which some might consider worse than natural death. Tom didn’t even know where the bones came from, but that was a mystery for him to solve, and he did enjoy solving mysteries.

Like the mystery of who gave Harry the venomous lily, which he would be getting to very shortly.

“I- what- who are you?” Cedric stuttered when he’d regained his ability to speak.

“You are Cedric Diggory.” Tom stated, ignoring the question.

Cedric continued to look bewildered, more so when the crowd of ghosts surrounded them, watching eagerly for what was to come and most likely ready to report back to the sleepers at the gates. “Yes? Why?”

“Do you know anything about flowers, Diggory?” Tom asked, expressionless.

Cedric frowned. “Like herbology? I do know a bit about, you know, devil’s snares and-”

“What do you know of lilies?”

Cedric blinked. “Nothing, I don’t think. Why?”

Tom ignored this question too and started down a different road of reasoning. “Your entire family is a wizarding family, isn’t it? I believe I remember there being Diggorys around when I was still in the living world.”

“Yes sir, we are. I don’t understand-”

“So it would not be completely unreasonable to suggest that your father would have the physical capability of creating a magic poison that could send someone into a deep, enchanted coma, correct?”

Cedric looked around at the ghosts for help, but they offered nothing but placid smiles or no expression altogether. “... That sounds weirdly specific, if you don’t mind me saying so.”

Tom smiled, a cold, lazy smile, betraying nothing of the turmoil within. “Yes. It does.”

The colour, little as there was, drained from Cedric’s face. “Where _is_ my father? I thought I was with him… yeah, we were climbing, and… oh Merlin, we fell! What happened to him, is he okay?”

A glare was enough to shut Cedric up, but only for a second, as he was clenching his fist and about to demand answers when Tom did reply, silencing with his magic instead of talking over him.

“He is alive, which is more than I can say for you. You both fell, yes. Fell into comas. His was temporary. Yours was not. You both were cared for in the Garden of my lover.” Tom almost choked on the word out of grief, but he hit the pain out of his chest with his fist and continued. “Your father was returned to the living world without you when he awoke, and from what I understand he was none too happy about it. The King of Flowers sent you here to me, for you would never wake and were as good as dead beforehand anyway.”

Cedric glanced around again, taking in the sight with a new understanding in his eyes. “So you’re the King of…” he whispered, before trailing off and clearing his throat. “So then why have you woken me up?”

The bitter smile returned. “I have reason to believe that your father retaliated against the King of Flowers by sending him a poisoned flower, which has kept him in an unwaking sleep for months and does not show any signs of ceasing.”

Cedric took a step back on unsteady legs, clutching his own tombstone to keep balanced. “What? No. I can’t believe my father would do that, especially if your boyfriend _is_ innocent as you suggest.”

A monstrous rage reared its fiery head at the insinuation that Harry might be somehow at fault. Though he shuddered and contained it- only just- in lieu of finding out more information to save Harry, the beast must have shown itself on Tom’s face, for Cedric gasped and wildly shook his head.

“I don’t mean that! I only meant that I don’t know what happened! I was asleep, how could I know? I can’t help you anymore! Wh- what do you want from me?”

Tom schooled his face very carefully and calmed his heartbeat- he couldn’t kill the kid _twice_ after all- and gave Cedric his one request.

“Be a dear and give me your address.”

And Cedric, reacting out of either a naive sense of nobility or a fear for the cold rage in Tom’s eyes, gave it to him.

-

Amos Diggory lived in a small village overlooked by a dark, discomforting forest, whose floor was so riddled with pine needles that it muffled all noise, giving way to a deep and unnerving silence. This silence was quickly broken when the Graveyard and the Garden materialised there together, seamlessly in the mist.

The whispers of ghosts and former dreamers mingled in the hushed gloom of the forest.

Though the entrances of Tom’s and Harry’s domains still connected to each other, before their very eyes, the ground of the Garden began to shake and shift. Specifically, the ground near where Tom and Harry always met. The crowd let Tom pass through so he was the closest to the commotion with a front row seat, and as he passed them he realised that it was _their_ magic causing such a great change. Perhaps it was the Garden’s magic being channelled through them, as the grass wrapped around the legs of many of the former sleepers and seemed to thrum like a lifeline to them.

It began with vines. Two as thick as Tom’s arms burst from the ground and launched over the wall, digging into the ground on the other side like grappling hooks. They stayed suspended in the air in two perfect arches, quickly followed underneath by actual _trees_ sprouting from the grass and growing to full size right in front of him. Those too arched and criss-crossed in some kind of plait pattern, forming… a bridge over the wall, which was completed when bright bulbous flowers grew from the sides and joined the path of the tree trunks to the vines above, colouring the bridge’s sides in glorious yellows, pinks, blues and reds. Orange was strangely absent.

It was stunning.

And Harry wasn’t even awake to see it.

Oh, that thought brought Tom’s rage crashing back down on him- better that than the crushing despair that threatened to overtake him at any sign of weakness. Frowning, Tom took a deep breath and awoke himself from his engrossment with the bridge.

The Garden clearly meant for him to leave. For him to go to Diggory and find a way to awaken Harry. For him to exact revenge- or maybe that was just Tom. Whatever. He’d do it anyway.

Before all this, Tom had thought there was a risk of death. From leaving. He glanced at the bridge, then back to the Graveyard and everyone in between, counting on him to save Harry. Of course it wasn’t them that he cared about, it was Harry himself. If Tom died, he wouldn’t be able to save…

No. That was a lie.

He was concerned- _no_ , he had to face it.

He was scared of death.

Always had been, though the fear had lain entirely dormant since he’d become the King of Skulls. And now… yes, it did unnerve him.

But if the Garden had created a _bridge_ for him, clearly wanting him to succeed, then surely leaving couldn’t be fatal. And regardless… he had to try. If he ever wanted to see Harry again- awake, not a shell of himself- then he had to try.

He steadied himself, and then he walked. Slowly, but he could pretend to himself this was to create dramatic tension rather than because he was afraid. His black shoes creaked against the wood underfoot, and was it just him or were the flowers on the natural handrail turning to face him as he walked past?

Merlin, he needed Harry to deal with this.

But for now, he was on his own.

His foot touched the floor on the other side without consequence, and his relief was like a sigh that swept over him and eliminated all fear. It left behind only clarity.

Straightening his posture and setting his jaw, Tom set off towards the village.

When he breached the trees, the silence of the forest was lifted. Tom used magic to ease his passage down the hill; it would not do to slip and fall on his first outing from his domain, and the hill was steep and towering over the village. The village itself was quiet- though not without its own backdrop of domestic sounds, of course- and peaceful, and very clearly an all-magic dwelling.

Birds sang, their lofty notes drifting in the calm breeze. From the forest, leaves fell and wafted lazily to the ground. The rustle of a train didn’t disturb but strangely added to the peaceful dwelling- an old steam train that Tom would have been surprised still ran were this not a magical village. A few sheep trotted along on either side of the tracks, uncaring and clearly used to the train’s presence. On lines above the town, clothes pinned themselves up, fluttering like flags to mark the area so clearly and dearly inhabited. In the distance, there was the friendly splashing of running water, perhaps from a brook or stream, or perhaps even a fountain obscured by the houses at the bottom of the hill. Though it was daytime, everything around Tom gave the impression of sleepiness, but also brightness. There was a spark of magic about the town that, even now, Tom found inviting.

It was a different time here, and most certainly a different place. Tom could imagine having a picnic with Harry on the ground he walked on, maybe in the summer. When Harry was awake. Yes, when Harry was awake.

He knew Harry would love this place, so similar and yet so different to his Garden. It was no paradise; it was only a sleepy village, which had moved through time without them yet which rested so slowly. But it had its own comfortable appeal. Tom couldn’t call his Graveyard or Harry’s Garden _comfortable_ . But perhaps with this turn, Tom and Harry would be able to leave, even for short amounts of time? They could go anywhere, see anything, _do_ anything!

The urge to romance Harry atop the Eiffel Tower was burning. To boat with him down the canals of Venice. To buy everything his heart desired in Diagon Alley or Hogsmeade. To exist outside the lonely confines of his Graveyard for once, with the one he desired beside him.

Of course, to do that he would have to stop fantasizing about the future and get Harry back _now,_ peace of the town be damned.

He reached the village’s edge and it opened with barely a gesture. Did the town understand the dark shadow that was passing through it as he entered? It did not matter, he decided. His wrath was meant for Amos Diggory alone.

From here he let his connection with the Graveyard take over, allowing him to see the information Cedric willingly allowed him to take. This connection guided him through twists and turns, even past a church and a cemetery that seemed to stiffen at his approach. It led him to a large house at the bottom of a cul-de-sac that was white with little yellow accents on the window ledges. A press of Tom’s magic confirmed that Amos Diggory was indeed inside, and that he was indeed alone.

Tom didn’t bother knocking.

The door didn’t make a sound as he opened it, and it closed silently behind him too. He had considered how he would do this in the short amount of time after he had conversed with Cedric. He had eventually decided to use the same approach that he’d used with his son, and of course if that failed he could always string Diggory up by the ankles and skin him until he revealed something useful. Harry didn’t need to know.

For now, however, he muttered _“Absconda!”_ and searched the house, assured that Diggory would not be able to see him. He did not need to search for long, as he found the despicable man in the obnoxiously yellow kitchen. Making tea.

As his back was turned, Tom saw no issue in pulling out a chair from the table in the centre of the room, facing Diggory. He sat and made himself comfortable, and then spoke in a low, bored tone.

_“Detego.”_

Diggory jumped out of his bones, spilling tea all over the counter and himself. He whipped around to face Tom, holding the teacup in front of him threateningly.

“Who- who are you?!” he blundered, very much red in the face. Tom considered this a good start.

“My name is Tom Riddle,” he intoned. “I am the King of Skulls.”

Immediately Diggory’s expression dropped. Instead of the cup, he now pulled out his wand. The intimidating gesture was lessened somewhat by the fact that Diggory was still dripping with hot tea, and that they were in the middle of his bright yellow kitchen, with the sunrays streaking in through the circular windows.

The look Tom aimed towards the man was unimpressed.

“Where is my _son?!”_ Diggory growled.

Tom merely raised an eyebrow. “I see you’ve heard of me,” he commented.

Diggory jabbed his wand towards Tom angrily. A few sparks flew out. _“You’re_ the one who has my son, and I _demand_ that you bring him back to me!”

“Consider your demand noted. Now will you sit down so we may have a civil discussion?”

Tom stared the man down without blinking, and though it took him some time, eventually Diggory pulled out another chair and sat heavily into it.

“I am not here to talk about Cedric Diggory. I am here to talk about Harry Potter. You probably know him as the King of Flowers.” Tom paused and waiting for a reaction.

He was not disappointed. Diggory nodded, barking out a malicious laugh as he did so. “So my creation worked, then, did it? Good. We Diggorys have always had a penchant for herbology. It wasn’t very hard to get the flower to do what I wanted. He’s still asleep, then?”

Tom did not want to give Diggory the satisfaction of gaining control of the conversation. “Do you think Cedric would approve of your method?”

Instead of a quelling effect, Diggory grew hostile again. “How _dare_ you use my boy to manipulate me! You and- what was his name- _Potter,_ how dare you condemn my retaliation, when the both of you are _murderers!”_

Tom raised an eyebrow, containing the rising fury within him. “That’s _your majesty_ to you, you disgusting little man,” he sneered. “Now, you will tell me how to lift your curse on the King of Flowers, and I will consider not ripping you apart with my bare hands and eating your heart raw.”

A flicker of fear appeared on Diggory’s face, and Tom became aware of a minor change in his own appearance. As he was still drawing on his connection to the Graveyard, the Graveyard had poured a bit of itself into him in return, staining his eyes a deep red and darkening the air around him. His clothes were cloaked in shadow, and his skin, he noticed, had become as white as bleached bone.

He smiled.

“Speak.”

Diggory shifted away from him ever so slightly, a tremor taking root in his form. He shook his head. “I only did to Potter what he did to my boy… if you give Cedric back to me I’ll lift the curse!”

Tom scoffed, his voice lowering to a menacing hiss. “And why would I do something like that? Why would I _reward_ you for your despicable actions?”

“If you want him to wake up again-”

Tom stood and threw his fists down on the table with a loud bang. “If you want to live past the next _five minutes_ you will tell me exactly how to revive him. If you do not, I will personally see to it that you will suffer in _unimaginable_ agony for the rest of your short fucking life!”

There was no other way to describe Diggory’s actions; he _cowered._

But still, he did not bend. “Then I will see my Cedric again!” he squeaked. “But I will _not_ tell you _anything_ unless you bring him back!”

Tom snarled, a deep and terrible sound even to his own ears. He rolled his shoulders and in doing so released his aura into the room, caging Amos in a room surrounded by the shadowy depth of death. An unholy chill emanated from deep inside Tom’s gut, and a magic colder still froze his fingertips, enveloping his hand with the power to inflict pain beyond the worst cruciatus.

Thus was the power of the Graveyard. Thus was the power of Death. Thus was the power of the King of Skulls.

He prepared to unleash this power, this curse, upon the snivelling Amos Diggory, when he felt a tugging at the back of his mind. Small but insistent, the tugging would not leave him alone. It was coming from the same part of his mind as the power itself, perhaps why he noticed it so easily, and he realised that this too was coming from the Graveyard.

Was it Harry, miraculously awake again, telling him to stop?

There was a swelling in his heart immediately crushed by reality. If this was true then Diggory would not be in front of him, looking on the brink of death from fear alone. But the thought of Harry’s light and innocence gave him pause, and reluctantly he followed the tug until it opened a link.

The tugging was Cedric Diggory.

_“Don’t hurt him!”_

_“He will not tell me what I wish to know civilly. Therefore, it is time I use uncivil methods to gain what I need.”_

_“Let me speak to him then! At least, bring my body back. It might… move him. Please.”_

Tom sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose in a decidedly human gesture that calmed the monster that had taken hold only seconds before. He blinked away the red in his eyes, and resigned himself to the fate of being told what to do by a child for the second time that day. Only for Harry.

“A change of plans,” he announced. Diggory stared up at him in confused fear. “There’s someone who wishes to speak to you.”

Instead of following the tugging sensation, he pulled, and after a dizzying second of nothingness Cedric appeared in front of him, landing on his feet and lurching until he clutched the table. Tom could feel the power in his hands almost like a leash between Cedric and the Graveyard. Cedric, like himself, was not released from his confines. Just temporarily let out.

Cedric shook his head and then stared at him accusingly, though with little real heat.

“Honestly, that was worse than apparition-!”

_“CEDRIC!”_

Diggory pulled his son into what must have been a bone-crushing hug, sobbing loudly into his shoulder. Cedric, to his credit, retained most of his composure whilst also hugging his father back with equal fervour.

“My boy… my boy…” Diggory murmured, when he had stopped sobbing quite so much.

“Hello father,” Cedric whispered, giving the other a bittersweet smile. “I need you to help us wake the King of Flowers up now, please. I do wish you hadn’t done that.”

Diggory sobbed again. “I know, my boy, I know… but I was so angry… he took you away from me- he _killed_ you!”

Cedric held his father tighter. “No, he didn’t. The mountains did. I remember now that I fell- that _we_ fell. I’m just glad you’re alright, you and mother. Where is she?”

Diggory sniffed. “Oh, she’s out at the market. She’ll be so happy to see you-”

Tom watched these interactions with distaste. He tugged a little on the figurative leash, and Cedric jolted. Tom smirked ever so slightly, but otherwise kept his expression impassive.

“Okay, father, please tell me how to wake up Harry now.”

His father sniffled and released Cedric from his grasp, and for a moment Tom thought he would refuse again, but instead he reached deep into his pocket and brought out an old scrap of parchment. “It was a complicated piece of magic- part herbology, part charm, part potion. Everything I did I wrote down. Trial and error, you see. Well, this is the correct version. It’s all you need- all _he_ needs to wake that other boy up.” Amos’ gaze flickered briefly to Tom, but back to Cedric immediately afterwards.

Cedric took the parchment and passed it to Tom.

Ah, the weakness of love-bound men. Tom knew it well. Unfortunately for Amos, however, Tom was not a weak man.

“Alright, that’s all I needed. Time to go.”

Before the other two had a chance to process this remark, Tom released his control over Cedric, thereby releasing the connection Cedric had with the Graveyard for just one second. Though Cedric was pulled back to the Graveyard, this living body the Graveyard must have created for him in order to survive outside of its gates did not. It hovered, suspended for less than a second, before it began to rattle. Cedric’s body tore itself into nothing, crumbling into dust right before their eyes, until falling to the floor in a heap of squirming ash.

Tom, mildly surprised but not at all disappointed, stepped back and made to leave.

Amos made a strangled sound deep in his throat.

“All I wanted... was my boy…” He whimpered, staring at the pile of ash and bone where his son had stood. He had not dropped his arms from where a moment ago they had clutched his son to him.

“He was already dead,” Tom said contemptuously. “Nothing you or I could have done would have prevented that…. but at least you _knew._ You _knew_ what happened to him, you didn’t waste away wondering what had happened. Wondering if he had lost interest, if he had gone missing, if he had… died. At least you knew.”

“At least you will see him again,” Amos retorted, voice cracking.

It took Tom a while to say anything to that, but when he did it was out of courtesy for Harry and Cedric rather than any desire to comfort this disgrace. “You will see him again, in time,” he said. “But he wouldn’t want you to take revenge, or waste your life mourning him. He would want you to live.”

Had Amos heard his words? He did not show any reaction to them. But this was not Tom’s concern; Amos deserved this punishment for what he’d done to Harry anyway. At least he could tell Harry he hadn’t been _wholly_ unkind. More or less.

He let himself out of the house.

All the way back up that hill and into the forest Tom clutched that note, having checked that it was in fact what he needed to bring Harry back. It was the only way to make sure it did not vanish in the time that it took to return.

He barely noticed anything around him until he had reached the bridge, and even then he had stepped onto the soil on the other side before he broke his stride. Momentarily he worried that the Garden might not appreciate his methods, being linked to Harry and all, but instead he felt only a sense of satisfaction in the air. Of course, Tom should have realised that not all plants were flowers.

How much damage could the Garden do on its own with only the plants inside to wreak havoc on its behalf? Tom shuddered to think, and turned his attention to Colin, who had come to speak to him.

“Cedric is angry with you,” was Colin’s sheepish greeting.

Tom rolled his eyes but decided to humour the boy for one moment. The crowd, for there was still an undispersed crowd waiting near the gates, eyed the parchment in his hand curiously. Though he knew they all wanted the same thing, he could not help but pocket it where he could feel its comforting weight against his thigh.

Waiting for Tom at his own grave, Cedric was indeed angry.

“Why would you do that to him?! To us?!” he yelled, stalking towards Tom with a fire in his eyes.

Tom gave a dismissive hand gesture to the ghosts who had followed before he spoke. “Why not?” he asked. “He deserved it anyway; he put my lover in a coma and I gave him a little scare. I think he came off lightly.”

Cedric shook his head. “What about me? How do _I_ deserve that?”

“You are dead, Cedric Diggory. You will see your father again, years from now when he is cold and in the ground.”

Cedric was about to protest further, but Tom had had enough. He grabbed Cedric by his lapels and pushed the boy backwards into his grave. By the time he hit his coffin he was stiff and motionless once more.

That business done, he headed for the gazebo at last.

“Is the cure on that piece of parchment?” Colin asked him, having decided to tag along and now matching his pace as he walked the poppy-lined path.

“Yes.”

“Have you read it yet?”

Tom eyed him in his periphery. “No.”

“Then how do you know it’s the cure?”

“Merlin- do you ever shut up?”

“Sorry.” Colin managed to stay silent for a few moments for piping up again, much to Tom’s irritation. “Do you think we’ll get to stay awake when Harry wakes up?”

Tom hesitated. “... No.”

Colin nodded as if this was the answer he’d anticipated. “No, I don’t think so either. Still, it was nice of him to wake us up in the first place.”

Tom frowned, stepping over a stray tree root as he did so. “Harry woke you up? Not the Garden itself?”

“Yeah- we all saw him for a second in his full glory, right before we jolted awake. You should have seen him, your majesty… he must have used a lot of power to do that, and it showed…”

“You’re telling me that Harry had a reserve of power and he used it, not to save himself or to call for help, but to wake up everyone in his Garden?” They would be discussing this when he woke Harry up, that was for sure.

But Colin was shaking his head. “That _was_ his call for help. How do you think we found you? Luck? We tried sending messages like Harry did but because we were awake, we couldn’t automatically find the Graveyard. We searched and searched, guiding the Garden about like a ship at sea, gaining newcomers as we went. Eventually one of us volunteered to die to get our lands to merge, and it worked!” Colin grinned, and even Tom thought it was strange to look like that when talking about death.

Yet, he considered Colin’s words. “Do you think that’s what Harry wanted?” he asked.

Colin shrugged. “I dunno, I only met him twice. But I think he’ll be proud of us when he wakes up- or at least I hope so.”

They reached the gazebo finally, and Tom was spared from having to find a reply to that.

There was still no change in Harry, but that was to be expected considering all Diggory had done was give him a list, which he pulled out.

There was in fact a mixture of incantations, ingredients, and wand movement indicators. Some of the ingredients he recognised immediately:

_Water (cold!)_

_Infusion of wormwood_

_Powdered root of asphodel_

_(anti-clockwise stirring this time!)_

_Valerian root_

_Sopophorous bean_

_~~Sloth brain~~  T_ _urtle brain will do._

These were the somewhat butchered ingredients of the Draught of Living Death- diluted through the use of different ingredients and stirring techniques, yes, but obvious enough on paper. It was also why Tom hadn’t realised on his inspection of the flower; it was diluted enough that it could no longer be physically sensed.

But for Tom, easy enough to undo once he put his mind to it with a Wiggenweld Potion.

Now for the other ingredients- some of the ingredients of the Polyjuice mixed with others, sure, for the glamour, and then the incantation for the glamour itself, and- ah.

Truly, Diggory had gone all out on his revenge to have _spell-crafted_ some kind of symbiote charm specifically for the flower. These were incantations he’d never seen before, but he knew the tell-tale signs of a self-created spell. He hadn’t thought Diggory intelligent enough. But he must have completed the spell quickly in order to take his revenge on Harry so soon, and therefore the spell couldn’t be _too_ powerful, especially now that Tom had Diggory’s notes on it.

Which meant that Tom could easily counter that one too.

The next was the identification of multiple mutation spells Diggory had used to grow and enhance the thorns Tom had seen, along with a sharpening spell, because Diggory just had to be _that_ kind of arsehole. There were also two lines that were completely scribbled out, and from what Tom could make out they referred to some kind of dissolving sand, or dark sand, or something-beginning-with-d sand. Presumably, though, because they were scribbled out it meant that they were not included in the concoction after all.  

And finally, the last ingredient on the list:

_Pixie blood._

An catalyst to make any potion more malicious and more fast-acting, this was most certainly used to add to the pain Harry would have felt, and would have increased the rate of paralysation by increasing blood pressure and therefore helping the bastardised Draught of Living Death reach all parts of the body faster.

None of the information was making Tom less bloodthirsty, but it did give him a place to start, and that was more than he’d had in _months._

He began immediately.

-

Tom remained in the gazebo for weeks without leaving.

Everything he needed the Garden provided, or was retrieved for him by the former dreamers. He had wondered on occasion why none of them had tried to leave while they could, but the few that he asked only shook their heads and smiled.

“Some things are just beyond our control,” one said, and the knowledge both disturbed Tom and quelled his curiosity, for he thought he understood precisely what they meant.

Tom’s need to revive Harry, for example, was beyond his own control.

The chill could not touch him, the work could not tire him, and the dark could not blind him. The fumes of his cauldron rose in heavy rainbows above him, above Harry, above the highest branch of the redwood. He did not allow himself to ascend those steps again, for though he was now so close to Harry, Harry wasn’t really there. Not yet.

Could Harry, even in sleep, hear the clinking of crystal as Tom painstakingly poured out each measurement correct to the millimetre? Could he smell the sparkling flame, the spiced amelior apples, the sprig of mint taken from Harry’s own plants? Tom could barely smell them himself by the end, which was probably a good thing in retrospect as a few of the ingredients included more sloth brain and flobberworm mucus. Hopefully Harry wouldn’t smell those either.

Regardless of this, or of anything else, he tackled each obstacle one by one, week by week, and though it took time…

… so much time…

… eventually Tom had the antidote almost ready.

It was raining on the day that he was set to complete everything, and the smell of wet dirt and plants cleared the perfumed air and gave Tom a sense of clarity that had been missing for some time from his obsessed mind. Now he allowed himself to walk those stairs, surrounded by the turquoise steam of his still-brewing Wiggenweld potion, to return to Harry’s side and alleviate some of that pain he clearly felt.

Like picking apart a spider’s web, Tom plucked at Diggory’s spellwork until each thread snapped and it entirely unravelled, letting Harry’s fist unclench and leaving the lily to fall to the ground and wither away into dust.

Next he pulled out a shard of black onyx he had drenched in a magnetising potion, pressing it into Harry’s limp and bloody palm. Though the effect of this one would be slower, something in the air around Harry shifted and Tom knew it had begun to siphon from Harry the pixie blood in his system that was causing him to be in so much pain.

And now to wait the few more seconds until the smoke drifting up to him completely dissipated and cleared the gazebo. It only took a moment for the smoke to disappear, less for the sound of the sizzling pot to cease, meaning the potion was cool enough to consume. Meaning it was ready.

A murmured _“Accio,”_ and an outstretched hand. A phial against motionless lips. Still silence surrounded by sheets of rain.

And…

… nothing.

… What?

He had done everything perfectly. He had removed the enchantments, removed the agitator, and cured the diluted Draught of Living Death. What more was there? What had he missed? Why was Harry still dead to the world and unreachable to Tom?

The phial shattered in Tom’s hand, and he threw the pieces to the floor.

“Trouble?”

Tom almost growled as he spun to face the intruder, a quiet and wet-from-the-rain Colin Creevey. With narrowed eyes, he bit out a short response. “... Yes.”

“What’s the problem?” Colin asked in that annoying optimistic tone of his.

Tom gritted his teeth. “It’s not working. I did everything right and it’s not working!”

Colin ascended the stairs to look at his handiwork, which was not particularly evident on Harry’s sleeping form.

“Well, he certainly looks healthier?” Colin said. Tom resisted the urge to hit something. “I mean you could always try to ask him what’s wrong.”

Ah yes. Fantastic idea, except for one small flaw. “In case you haven’t noticed, he’s still asleep.”

Colin shrugged. “Yes, but maybe if you fall asleep you can reach him in his dreams. We tried it before and it didn’t quite work, but since you’re not from the Garden it might be easier for you.”

Tom considered this, then considered it some more. “You mean to say,” he said slowly, “that in these past few weeks, I could have spoken to Harry _at any time?”_

Colin swallowed but otherwise stayed calm. “Well, are you going to do it, or are you going to stand around being mad that you didn’t do it earlier?”

Unfortunately he could not fault that logic, so he ignored Colin instead, turning around and sinking down so that he sat with his back against the throne, Harry’s hand dangling next to his head. More lilies reached up to wrap around his ankles, and though Tom jerked away initially, they were insistent and he let them be.

Colin only smiled. “Do you need me to show you how?”

Tom glared at him. “I know how to _sleep_ ,” Tom bit out, on the verge of cursing Colin out of the gazebo.

While Tom hadn’t needed to sleep since he’d died, he found it almost easy now, certainly easier than he’d ever found it in life. Perhaps it was because he was being aided by the Garden which wanted its master back, or maybe Tom was just managing it on his own, but either way soon he felt his consciousness enter a world separate from his body and knew that he had succeeded.

-

This world was… different.

It was dark, and he was in a hedge maze.

More specifically, he was in a dead end somewhere in the midst of it, Harry’s throne inexplicably behind him, with no other choice but to go forwards.

Contrasting deeply with what Tom usually associated with Harry, it was devoid of lilies or indeed, as far as Tom could tell, any life whatsoever. The sky was dark and full of stars, the only remotely pleasant thing in sight, and he swore he could smell bluebells.

“Harry?” Tom called out, but there was no answer. Harry’s throne was empty and he was nowhere in sight.

Setting his jaw, Tom walked forwards until he came to a junction. Both paths looked the same, dark and uninviting. Was this what Harry’s dreams were usually like, or was this the effect of whatever was still keeping him asleep? Somehow Tom doubted that Harry could dream as dark as this on his own. He picked the left path at random and continued to walk the maze.

He turned.

He walked.

He turned.

He walked.

He turned.

He did not know for how long he walked, taking paths on a whim and coming across nothing but the same hedge walls at every turn, and no Harry. A few times the temperature shifted, brushing Tom with a chill that took too long to disappear, but he couldn’t see what caused it.

It was what seemed like ages later when there was a difference. The path became wider, the hedges slightly lower, and Tom sped up, scanning everything he could for even a glimpse of the man he loved. It turned out he didn’t need to, however; the next turn led to what seemed to be the centre of the maze. A statue rose high above the hedges, and Tom wondered why he hadn’t seen it when he was walking, but the thought was dashed from his mind as he spotted the figure standing at the bottom of the statue.

 _“Harry,”_ he breathed.

Harry turned, but his visage was obscured by a sprinkling of gold; a curtain of floating sand that orbited him and distorted his visage. Still, the sight of a moving, living, conscious Harry brought a smile to Tom’s face as he approached.

“Harry? Do you hear me?”

Harry reached out in front of him, towards Tom, but the curtain of sand did not let his hand pass through. Tom thought he saw Harry’s mouth move, but even if he did form words, Tom could not hear them. Tom reached with his own hand to touch Harry’s but the sand bunched together and would not allow it.

So this was what still kept Harry asleep, then.

Of course. The lines that Diggory had scribbled out- dream sand. A particular brand of sleeping powder that specifically pitted the sleeper against himself, as they did not know they were sleeping at all. That was… irritating. But the dream sand was not created with beings such as Kings of Flowers and Skulls in mind.

“Harry, love, can give me an indication that you can hear me?”

Harry turned from him, shaking his head- no, looking for the source of the voice. Even though Tom couldn’t see him fully, he could see that Harry looked helpless, and it filled him with a cold rage on his behalf.

It took a great effort on Tom’s part to sound as calm as he did. “Harry. I’m here. You are with me and you are safe.”

Tom looked around for anything that could help him. There was a breeze running through the clearing, and the sound of a fountain running at the statue’s base, but no obvious way to counter the sand. Physically he couldn’t move the sand, and Harry evidently couldn’t do anything either, and Merlin was it hard to think with that incessant trickling sound of the fountain-

...

Ah.

“Harry, do you hear that?” Tom spoke in a hushed tone. “The rain, do you hear it? It’s raining outside the gazebo, like it was raining on the day that I kissed you for the very first time. Do you remember? Listen to the rain, Harry. Listen very closely.”

Harry took a step forward and the sand moved with him. He did, however, cock his head. A few seconds passed when nothing happened, and Tom was about to try again when it started raining.

The sudden cold made him start in surprise, but as he registered what had happened he began to laugh. It was a different feeling to the one he usually felt in the rain, for certain. It usually did not bother him if he had his umbrella, but it _did_ make everything darker and... heavier, in the Graveyard. And while he had shelter, just like Harry did, his was a mausoleum which blocked out all sound from outside.

Now, though. Now the rain told a story.

It began with the sensation of crushing loneliness, crushing isolation stifling the air. But as a raindrop fell on him, more and more as the rain grew thicker- it washed those feelings away, and made him… purer. Now the rain did not make things darker, it gave out light. Hope. Like life itself was falling from the sky, tinged with a sickle of sadness, of loneliness, that only made it feel more real. It was refreshingly cold, startlingly so, and Tom realised: the rain made him feel awake. And he knew without knowing that this must be how Harry himself experienced the rain.

From out of nowhere came the smell of freshly brewed tea.

Harry was smiling.

“Harry, my love,” Tom could not help but praise as he continued on this path. “My dearest, can you feel my hair in your hand? I’m sitting next to you, did you know that? It’s cold outside because of the rain, but I’m here keeping you warm. Can you feel that?”

There was a pressure on his hair and a warmth in his heart. He continued.

“There are lilies wrapped around your ankles, Harry, and they’re wrapped around mine too. Can you feel them curling? They’re quite heavy, wouldn’t you say?”

Harry nodded. And then he could feel it too, that same weight on his ankle. And he knew that they were winning this.

“Follow that weight, Harry. Follow it, see where it leads, follow it-!”

The sand imploded.

It flattened itself to Harry’s form and stilled it like a violent second skin. Suddenly it was not raining after all- as soon as they had come the sensations were torn away, leaving in their place only Harry’s pained cries.

He forced his way towards Harry, drawing on his strength, drawing on the Graveyard’s strength, drawing, drawing until his eyes were red and he felt a beast called Death around him, except that this wasn’t working and it wasn’t _helping_ and he could do _nothing-_

Because of course this was neither the living world nor the Graveyard, it was the Garden, and furthermore they were inside a dream, _Harry’s_ dream. And the only one who could truly free Harry from this was Harry himself.

He projected these thoughts to Harry as best he could, trying to make him _see_ where he could not see, fumbling for his hand though he knew he could not touch it, and in a moment of clarity Harry froze, as if he could feel no more pain. He sat up. And he caught Tom’s eye.

It was perhaps the slowest second of Tom’s life. He could see in clear detail Harry’s figure; the outline of Harry’s messy hair, his battered glasses, his hands curled into fists in this dream too. The vision was marred by the sand, which looked less glittering and more disgusting now, like a strange sort of fungi that had mutated into something that neither Tom nor Harry wanted to be anywhere near. But this was not the most striking part. The most striking part was Harry’s eyes, which Tom could barely look away from once he was caught in that gaze. The piercing green there, uncovered just for a second, that struck Tom with the most profound connection he had ever had in his life. In Harry’s gaze was recognition. Hope. No small amount of fear, and no small amount of love either. And then, right at the end, they hardened into the fiery, passionate stare of a man who was about to hammer success right out of any obstacle in his path.

The moment broke.

And then the world began to shift.

It began with the hedges, which rustled and then burst into bloom with the most vibrant flowers Tom had ever seen. And then came the ground, sprouting grass and trees and daisies quicker than Tom could fathom. Light, there was so much light! Weeds became forests, the statue became a monument, the fountain became a waterfall-

And then came Harry, whose hair weaved bluebells into its messy curls, whose skin darkened with a sun-flushed glow, whose eyes gave out a piercing green hue that was magnified by his glasses. Whose aura grew and grew, filling the gloom with light and life and the smell of wet dirt and-

-

Tom woke with a gasp that was immediately echoed by the man sitting beside him.

They were awake.

 _He_ was awake.

Tom turned around so fast that his neck flared warningly, but he barely even noticed, too engrossed was he in the sight of Harry _finally moving._ Harry’s eyes took a while to find him as they were unfocused and heavy-looking, but when Harry saw him, _really_ saw him, his face broke into an ecstatic grin.

“Hi Tom,” he said, and pulled him slowly but firmly into his gentle embrace.

It felt like comfort and strength and home. Tom had missed this home.

“Harry,” Tom mumbled into his shoulder, for what else could he say, now that Harry was finally here?

“I missed you,” Harry whispered back, and Tom pulled away. Harry’s appearance was entirely unchanged apart from a few monumental details- the weariness in his eyes and the shadows underneath had not been there moments before.

Tom frowned. “Where were you?”

Harry smiled, and it was bittersweet. “In my head, I guess. But I’m here now.”

Tom held out his hand to help Harry stand, hearing the footprints of many approaching someones even over the pattering of the rain, and when Harry took it, Tom pulled him up into a kiss.

They fit like they were made for each other, possibly because they were. Harry should have been frail underneath him but Harry _was_ Tom’s strength, and becoming more and more alive with every second that passed, moaning and clutching at him equally as desperately as Tom himself was clutching Harry, needing to feel, to confirm the truth of it. That Harry was real and awake after all this time, that they had won and this kiss was their prize. The first of many such prizes.

“Yes,” Tom crooned, in an attempt to soothe himself as much as Harry. “You’re here now.”

Harry pulled back to take him in, and Tom reddened to think how _he_ must look, after weeks of… yes, he could see Harry’s disapproval already.

“What on earth have you been doing to yourself?!” Harry exclaimed, frowning.

“What do you think?” Tom responded, grasping Harry’s arms to emphasise his point. “No, honestly, tell me. You don’t think that I could have lived with myself if I didn’t do everything in my power to get you back, did you?”

Harry looked taken aback, and though Tom wanted to soothe again, to take back the bite in his words, he needed Harry to understand. “I just… I guess… I haven’t been here,” Harry said. “So I don’t know. How did you-?”

Tom pointed down to where the cauldron, desk, chair, and haphazardly placed ingredients were. “Diggory gave me- with prodding- his notes detailing exactly what he did to you. So I spent my time reversing it.”

“So it _was_ Amos,” Harry said, looking away. His eyes were unnervingly haunted- even now, even now when Harry was here he was still suffering at the hands of that vile cockroach.

“He paid for it,” Tom spat. Not as much as Tom would like, but he did.

Harry refocused his gaze on Tom, his mouth pulling into a hard line. “Good,” he said, and that told Tom more about Harry’s experience than anything else possibly could.

Tom took Harry’s face in his hands and pressed a kiss to his forehead. “You don’t have to tell me what is was like if you’d rather not,” he whispered into Harry’s hair like a secret.

Harry twisted his fingers into Tom’s shirt and rested his head in the crook of Tom’s neck. His reply was quiet, but Tom still heard. “In time,” he mumbled, and Tom nodded gently so as not to disturb him.

“You know it was you in the end who beat it,” Tom said with a raised eyebrow, though Harry couldn’t see it.

“But you-”

“Yes, but in the end it was your particular brand of strength that saved yourself. I’m… proud of you.”

Harry didn’t respond to that, clutching Tom ever closer. He was shaking, but Tom chose not to mention it, and stroked Harry’s hair, shoulders, and back instead.

And then Harry pulled back abruptly again. “Hang on,” he said, his brow furrowed. “You’re here. In the Garden.”

Tom nodded. “Correct.”

Harry waved his hand in a ‘go on’ gesture that made Tom’s lips curl up, amused.

“Your Garden and my Graveyard went to certain lengths to see you revived as well, not to mention the little army you woke up,” he said. He turned Harry to face the entrance to the gazebo, where the crowd of people had finally reached and were pouring in as he spoke. “Behold.”

Harry descended the steps to meet them, dragging Tom along by the hand as he did so.

“They were instrumental, Colin most of all,” Tom filled him in quietly enough that only Harry could hear, and Harry nodded his head almost imperceptibly.

Though the sea of people were content to gather at the bottom of the stairs, Colin bounded in front of them all to greet Harry.

“Your majesty!” he yelled, grinning, but then faltered like he hadn’t thought it out this far yet. He looked around. The crowd had begun to bow so he did the same, and Harry stopped him with a hand on the shoulder.

“Colin,” Harry greeted, amused. “It’s been a while. Thank you for everything you’ve done- you’re fantastic, really.”

Colin’s blush extended to his ears and he spluttered- dare Tom say it- endearingly. “Uh, so what happens now?”

Harry made a swivelling ‘turn around’ motion so that Colin would see what Tom and Harry were beginning to: the former sleepers had started to yawn. They watched on as one by one they collapsed.

“Party’s over, time to go home,” Tom quipped. Harry just nodded.

“How long?” Colin asked, biting his lip.

“For you?” Harry laughed. “Colin, you’re free to go.”

Colin faced them fully now, eyes wide. “For real?”

“For real. I think you know the way out by now,” Harry said, smiling.

Colin’s face lit up like a _Lumos_. “I- thank you, I- yes. I’ll write! I’ll write you a letter!” he backed away, bouncing with excitement. He ran a few steps before pausing, turning, and bowing once more. Then he burst out of the gazebo, a ringing “Thank you your majesties!” trailing behind him.

The rest of the crowd were all asleep.

“And then there were two,” Tom said, leaning into Harry and placing a hand on the small of his back.

Harry frowned, anxiety written across his features. “You don’t have to go too, do you?” he asked.

Tom’s tone darkened. “Never. Never again,” he promised, and even if either of the domains decided to challenge him on that, he was confident that allied with Harry, there was nothing that could stop them from being together ever again.

Somehow though, with all that had happened, Tom didn’t think that would be an issue.

Never again.

-

The King of Flowers ruled in the Garden.

To those who knew him his name was Harry.

His rule was content, for his subjects were the plants, the sleepers, and the ghosts that strayed to his part of the Garden. Many paths wound their way through tree-lined arches and poppy-laden trails, but his favourite was the one that bridged his Garden with another, the one that belonged to the _other_ king.

The King of Skulls ruled in the Graveyard, and to those who knew him his name was Tom. His rule was calm, for his subjects were the dead, the ghosts, and the occasional sleepwalker. Sometimes Tom would engage his victims in conversation before they died, and sometimes Harry would do this instead. These victims became ghosts, and if they were angry at Tom for taking them, Harry would always talk them around.

When Amos Diggory happened upon the Graveyard, bloody and lifeless and cold, neither spoke to him, and he did not return.

The ghosts that did return helped to keep the Garden and the Graveyard, ironically, livelier than it had ever been before, and they often swapped with the sleepers so that the ghosts could take a break from being perpetually awake and the sleepers could take a break from perpetually dreaming.

Anyone who spoke of their tale, which was over time reduced to a children’s story alongside The Warlock’s Hairy Heart and The Tale of the Three Brothers, spoke of how the two kings wed with bouquets of amaryllis; how they left their mark on the places they visited with small signs that only the most devoted to them could find; how they sent their sleepers into the living world to spread their story and reassure the families of the sleeping and the dead that they were in good hands.

And neither Harry nor Tom were lonely ever again, for though their legend faded with time, their love for each other did not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I'm a few months late. Whoops. But I started uni so that's cool! And hopefully I have a few more fics coming... this year... I hope... but in Nov I'll be doing NaNoWriMo so there probably won't be anything then. We'll see, basically. :p
> 
> As always, thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed! Please feel free to leave a comment or chat with me on tumblr @merrinpippy :)


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